Posted August 07, 2019
Hickory
Almost human
Registered: Dec 2010
From United Kingdom
Hooyaah
Lux dissipat tenebras
Registered: Dec 2014
From United States
Posted August 07, 2019
ninnyhammer: a fool or a simpleton, a ninny
McGuffins
🎶
Registered: Mar 2015
From Other
lolinc
roms! Roms! ROMS!
Registered: Jan 2011
From United States
Posted August 13, 2019
Wuzzle, means to mix.
Heh.
Heh.
scientiae
intexto perplexo
Registered: Jun 2011
From Australia
Posted August 17, 2019
1/3
zeffyr: … I know there are many people who aren't fluent English speakers here and learn some useful words/phrases/grammar structures while reading/writing here.
So I'd like to propose an idea of English Word of the Day. If you learned some new English word, phrase, saying etc. which isn't perceived as well-known by [non-native] English speakers, please share it here. … Great conversation; allow me to polish your English, and perhaps some of our well-spoken Finnish friends will help to finish it!
As you allude to, learning English is much more than memorizing vocabulary. Idiom, the ebb and flow of sounds that create the phomenic tapestry of spoken thought, is how we all communicate in every language. Idiom is being head over heels in love, when the head is normally over the heel!
Britain and the USA are divided by their common language (apologies to George Bernard Shaw) in many idioms. For instance, Americans almost universally say I want to write good, whereas proper English demands the comparative adjective well. (It gets even more confusing because I want to write good English is correct, but note the predicate adjective (after the verb, as opposed to a usually-hyphenated, attributive adjective before the noun), in this sentence: I want to write English well!) Another useful example of the diversion of usage is the word male. In British English this is an adjective, but in American an enthymemic "person" is assumed by the listener.
Americans never write spelt, instead preferring spelled.
Preamble: Etymology
In the vacuum left by the receding Roman Empire, the conquering wave of proto-Germanic Angels, Saxons and Jutes voyaged westward from the continent, diffusing into the Sceptered Isle and displacing the syncretic Celtic culture (whose remnants remain on the fringes, Cornish and Gaelic being examples).
Hence there are lots of words with Germanic derivations, like the be- prefix, in bestrewn, an adjective connoting a random arrangement: [i]At the wedding, the flowergirl left a petals bestrewn across the church aisle.*
./..2
________
* Aisle is a heteronym of isle, meaning an island, and both are pronounced like the contraction for I shall —— I’ll. :)
________
edit: lots of mixed references >_<
I have broken up the post. I broke Gog! :O
So I'd like to propose an idea of English Word of the Day. If you learned some new English word, phrase, saying etc. which isn't perceived as well-known by [non-native] English speakers, please share it here. …
As you allude to, learning English is much more than memorizing vocabulary. Idiom, the ebb and flow of sounds that create the phomenic tapestry of spoken thought, is how we all communicate in every language. Idiom is being head over heels in love, when the head is normally over the heel!
Britain and the USA are divided by their common language (apologies to George Bernard Shaw) in many idioms. For instance, Americans almost universally say I want to write good, whereas proper English demands the comparative adjective well. (It gets even more confusing because I want to write good English is correct, but note the predicate adjective (after the verb, as opposed to a usually-hyphenated, attributive adjective before the noun), in this sentence: I want to write English well!) Another useful example of the diversion of usage is the word male. In British English this is an adjective, but in American an enthymemic "person" is assumed by the listener.
Americans never write spelt, instead preferring spelled.
Preamble: Etymology
In the vacuum left by the receding Roman Empire, the conquering wave of proto-Germanic Angels, Saxons and Jutes voyaged westward from the continent, diffusing into the Sceptered Isle and displacing the syncretic Celtic culture (whose remnants remain on the fringes, Cornish and Gaelic being examples).
Hence there are lots of words with Germanic derivations, like the be- prefix, in bestrewn, an adjective connoting a random arrangement: [i]At the wedding, the flowergirl left a petals bestrewn across the church aisle.*
./..2
________
* Aisle is a heteronym of isle, meaning an island, and both are pronounced like the contraction for I shall —— I’ll. :)
________
edit: lots of mixed references >_<
I have broken up the post. I broke Gog! :O
Post edited August 17, 2019 by scientiae
scientiae
intexto perplexo
Registered: Jun 2011
From Australia
Posted August 17, 2019
2/3 In the same vein, the piratical perjorative is spelt blackguard, but it is correctly pronounced blaggard.
discombabulated
I also like apoplectic.
This word is coeval with cataplectic state, where a person is "struck" (Classical Greek plesein to strike) dumb.
A related condition is described by a cataleptic state, except the person is unconscious.
A synonym of lascivious, n.b., a terrific quotation from Paradise Lost.
ZFR: acerbic (adj.) harsh, bitter and forthright. Usually referring to a mood or tone of a comment, review or criticism. I like acidulous, too.
Is a grandiloquent term for laconic, named for the famous attribute of the Spartans.
Check out the entry in Roget's Thesaurus for Taciturnity.
Potzato: That's my French transpiring for you. … To be clear, 'Literally' in English is 'Littéralement' in French. Thanks to you that's not a mistake I will make again/soon ;-) Which is different to the homophonic littoral zone adjacent to water: a coastline.
Also:
figuratively — not fucking literally (which is usually what is connoted by the use of this term, ironically).
grimwerk: One can effect a change, for example. Effect can mean "to bring about" or "to cause to happen", both of which are actions. 
Hickory: On the subject of splitting hairs, the verb form that you highlight is used mostly in a formal context: 'brought about' or 'caused to happen' 'as a result'.
Egregious (adj): Outstandingly bad The word affect is also a heteronymic homonym, borrowed by the C20th science of the Self: psychology.
A plethora is too much of a good or bad thing.
Actually, contranyms are everywhere. Ancient Greek would be a much less powerful classification tool without them.
Someone who is oleaginous is often a grifter, and beneath contempt.
A sandbagger called also be called a grifter is a con artist (a person who gains the confidence of another to trick them, a confidence trickster).
./..3
discombabulated
I also like apoplectic.
This word is coeval with cataplectic state, where a person is "struck" (Classical Greek plesein to strike) dumb.
A related condition is described by a cataleptic state, except the person is unconscious.
A synonym of lascivious, n.b., a terrific quotation from Paradise Lost.
Is a grandiloquent term for laconic, named for the famous attribute of the Spartans.
Check out the entry in Roget's Thesaurus for Taciturnity.
Also:
figuratively — not fucking literally (which is usually what is connoted by the use of this term, ironically).
Egregious (adj): Outstandingly bad
A plethora is too much of a good or bad thing.
Actually, contranyms are everywhere. Ancient Greek would be a much less powerful classification tool without them.
Someone who is oleaginous is often a grifter, and beneath contempt.
A sandbagger called also be called a grifter is a con artist (a person who gains the confidence of another to trick them, a confidence trickster).
./..3
scientiae
intexto perplexo
Registered: Jun 2011
From Australia
Posted August 17, 2019
3/3
Hickory: Dwindle (vb): diminish gradually (in size, amount or strength)
Diminish (vb): make or become less Also, (musical) dimuendo is the opposite of a crescendo.
A heuristic for remembering the bodily position of someone supine is supine, spine-down (i.e., face-up), as opposed to prone. (Check out the section about The Difference Between Prone, Supine, and Prostrate.)
Hickory: Ach! There's an expression that slipped by me. Though to be precise, in this sense it would be 'off-kilter'. So now we have two uses. That's what I love about the internet: you'll always be corrected if/when necessary. :D To be pedantic for posterity: the hyphenated adjectival phrase is used attributively (before the noun) and without a hyphen as a predicate (after the verb).
Gerin: The phrase "back to square one" means the same as "back to the beginning." As in: My game was going so badly that I started over; it seemed easier to go back to square one than to try and fix the mess I was in. Precisely the same as the phrase from the top, taken from the Italian (music reference) da capo.
Or, for the more formal, a harridan.
A threefold distinction derived from German is applied by scholars to loan words on the basis of their degree of assimilation in the new host language.
A Gastwort ('guest word') retains its original pronunciation, spelling, and meaning. Examples are passé from French, diva from Italian, and leitmotiv from German.
A Fremdwort ('foreign word') has undergone partial assimilation, as have French garage and [/i]hotel[/i]. Garage has developed a secondary, Anglicized pronunciation ('garrij') and can be used as a verb; hotel, originally pronounced with a silent h as the older formulation an hotel shows, has for some time been pronounced like an English word, with the 'h' being sounded.
Finally, a Lehnwort ('loan word') has become a virtual native in the new language with no distinguishing characteristics. Loan word is thus an example of itself.
Geoffrey Hughes (Blackwell Publishing, 2002), A History of English Words.
And Immiscible means unable to be mixed.
But, don’t forget deaf people.
Just because they are unable to transceive sounds, doesn’t prevent them from language perception, as blind-mute Helen Keller demonstrated. (My favourite American Sign Language symbol is the one for fornication.**)
________
** A peace-sign has the index and pointer fingers extended with the thumb over the flexed ring and pinky fingers; make two peace signs, one in each hand, and pretend they are rabbit-eared bunnies kissing, palm-to-palm. :)
[Edits] That was crazy; too many references for the forum software to handle, I broke its little recursive brains without breaching the character limit. Yah! What do I win? :|
Diminish (vb): make or become less
A heuristic for remembering the bodily position of someone supine is supine, spine-down (i.e., face-up), as opposed to prone. (Check out the section about The Difference Between Prone, Supine, and Prostrate.)
Or, for the more formal, a harridan.
A threefold distinction derived from German is applied by scholars to loan words on the basis of their degree of assimilation in the new host language.
A Gastwort ('guest word') retains its original pronunciation, spelling, and meaning. Examples are passé from French, diva from Italian, and leitmotiv from German.
A Fremdwort ('foreign word') has undergone partial assimilation, as have French garage and [/i]hotel[/i]. Garage has developed a secondary, Anglicized pronunciation ('garrij') and can be used as a verb; hotel, originally pronounced with a silent h as the older formulation an hotel shows, has for some time been pronounced like an English word, with the 'h' being sounded.
Finally, a Lehnwort ('loan word') has become a virtual native in the new language with no distinguishing characteristics. Loan word is thus an example of itself.
Geoffrey Hughes (Blackwell Publishing, 2002), A History of English Words.
And Immiscible means unable to be mixed.
But, don’t forget deaf people.
Just because they are unable to transceive sounds, doesn’t prevent them from language perception, as blind-mute Helen Keller demonstrated. (My favourite American Sign Language symbol is the one for fornication.**)
________
** A peace-sign has the index and pointer fingers extended with the thumb over the flexed ring and pinky fingers; make two peace signs, one in each hand, and pretend they are rabbit-eared bunnies kissing, palm-to-palm. :)
[Edits] That was crazy; too many references for the forum software to handle, I broke its little recursive brains without breaching the character limit. Yah! What do I win? :|
Post edited August 17, 2019 by scientiae
HunchBluntley
language geek
Registered: Jul 2014
From United States
Posted August 17, 2019
I hail from a rural part of the country, and while it definitely wouldn't be uncommon to hear someone say this (particularly in casual speech, or among the poorly educated), it would, in many cases, quickly be pointed out as poor grammar among those with much education at all (even as little as just high school); it would be unheard-of in any speech or writing that could even remotely be described as "formal" (I would probably get snickered at if I used that formulation in so much as a text message).
It's certainly not considered acceptable English in the U.S. -- save, perhaps, by the most rabid linguistic relativists.
It's certainly not considered acceptable English in the U.S. -- save, perhaps, by the most rabid linguistic relativists.
scientiae
intexto perplexo
Registered: Jun 2011
From Australia
Posted August 17, 2019
It's certainly not considered acceptable English in the U.S. -- save, perhaps, by the most rabid linguistic relativists.
I guess that's what I get for relying on Robots for my contemporary American grammar snapshot. :)